Web Video Class for Nonprofits Quick Guide

Intros:Web Video Class for Nonprofits

  • Name, where do you work?
  • What did you like best about the production experience?
  • What was the biggest challenge?
  • How are you planning to use your outreach video?

New Media:

The Power of Web:

  • Discussion of examples:
    --> What did you like about these videos?
    --> What tactics are used to make them different than other videos?
    --> How can these videos receive increased visibility?

Why the Web is Powerful?

  • Traditional marketing:
    --> How many of you remember this movie? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vgd2pvBu6es
    --> The Lake House was released June 16, 2006.  On opening weekend, after a multimillion dollar marketing campaign promoting the two Hollywood stars, approximately 1.7 million people saw the film.
    --> After 3 months, the total box office for the movie was $52.3 million.  At $8 a ticket, this means that 6.5 million saw the movie at a cost between 20 and 60 million dollars.Non-traditional marketing:
  • Non-traditional marketing:
    --> Just three days after The Lake House left theatres, this video appeared on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vr3x_RRJdd4
    --> Since that day, it has recorded over 33 million views.  What do you think Free Hugs spent on it’s marketing?  Compare the 6.5 million people who saw The Lake House at a cost of $20-60 million, to the 33 million plus individuals who saw Free Hugs for practically nothing.

What is The Long Tail?

  • The phrase The Long Tail (as a proper noun with capitalized letters) was first coined by Chris Anderson in an October 2004 Wired magazine article to describe the niche strategy of businesses, such as Amazon.com or Netflix, that sell a large number of unique items, each in relatively small quantities.  Please refer to the Long Tail article excerpt.
  • Television is a good example of this as well.  “TV stations have a limited supply of profitable or ‘prime’ time slots during which people who generate an income will watch TV. These people with money to spend are targeted by advertisers who pay for the programming so the opportunity cost of each time slot is high. Stations, therefore, choose programs that have a high probability to appeal to people in the profitable demographics in order to guarantee a return. Twin Peaks, for example, did not have broad appeal but stayed on the air for two seasons because it attracted young professionals with money to spend. Generally, as the number of TV stations grows or TV programming is distributed through other digital channels, the key demographic individuals are split into ever-smaller groups. As the targeted groups become smaller niches, and the quantity of channels becomes less of an opportunity cost, previously ignored groups become profitable demographics in the long tail. These groups along the long tail then become targeted for television programming that might have niche appeal. As the opportunity cost goes down with more channels and smaller niches, the choice of TV programs grows and greater cultural diversity rises as long as there is money in it.” - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Long_Tail
  • Sites, which are examples of the Long Tail Theory in action are: Amazon.com, Rhapsody, Neftlix, YouTube, Myspace Music, Hypem.com, eBay, blogs

Anatomy of the Long Tail

How To Benefit From The Long Tail:

    • -->  First, get your video online – more on that in a minute
      -->  Next, you need to promote it.
      -->  What are some of the ways that you can promote your video?

How to Promote your Video:

    • a.    Submit to social video bookmarking sites -- Digg.com, Video Bomb, Flurl, StumbleVideo - all these sites have the potential to send you a lot of viewers if enough people vote for your video.
      b.    Submit to regular social bookmarking sites -- like Delicious, Reddit, BlinkList etc. These sites will link to videos and if enough people vote for it you can get a lot of visitors.
      c.    Email blogs with a similar theme/topic as your video. Ask them to post your video.  Use Google and Delicious to find such blogs.
      d.    Submit your video many different video sites, i.e. archive.org, MetaCafe, and many others. You can also use a site like TubeMogul.com to send your video to many sites at once.
      e.    Post your video in relevant discussion boards and forums.  Read their rules first and don’t spam. Make sure what you post is relevant to the forum and choose the busiest forums to post in.
      f.    Tag and describe your videos -- it is important to put the keywords that describe your video in the associated tags and description so search engines know what your video is about.
      g.    Send out a press release -- If your video is especially news worthy you may want to send out an online press release.
      h.    Make videos regularly, create your own website/blog and use MySpace/Facebook.  A one-off video may get popular but if you make videos regularly and place them on your own website AND MySpace/Facebook you can build up a large following.
      i.    Get help from your friends -- Get your friends to help by adding you to their MySpace, bookmarking your video on social bookmarking sites, adding your video as a favorite on YouTube, posting about your video on their site etc.
      j.    Choose the right thumbnail -- Whenever you decide to watch a video it is heavily influenced by the thumbnail (the little picture of the video clip) that you see first. If you can choose the thumbnail do so and make it sharp, clear, eye catching and relevant to your video.
      k.    Choose a catchy title -- A catchy title is just as important as a catchy thumbnail to encourage people to click that link to watch your video.

l.    For more tips, please visit: http://www.webtvwire.com/15-ways-to-promote-your-video-online/

What is the Best Way to Promote your Video?

    • -->  Answer is twofold:  1) Give people a reason to visit your site.  2)  Regularly.
      -->  What this means is if you have a blog/website, the more relevant the information you post, the more eyeballs you will get.  The more you update, the more individuals will come back over and over.
      -->  Here are some good examples of blogs/websites that do this:
      •    Large scale: http://weblog.greenpeace.org/makingwaves/
      •    Small scale: http://colinrhinesmith.com/
      •    My favorite: http://www.postsecret.com
      •    All of these blogs are updated regularly, providing new, fresh information

How to Provide Relevant Content:

    • -->  Become an expert in something
      -->  FYI Everyone is an expert where they work. 
      -->  Everyone here is an expert on what his/her organization does.  Make a blog about that.  And update it regularly.  And when you do, consider yourself a teacher.  You want to teach the world about what you are an expert in.  In approaching it this way, you will hopefully be providing useful content.
      -->  Link to other websites with relevant information.  Some blogs only link other sites.  By doing this, you can update frequently without having to provide all the content yourself.  Here’s an example of a blog that is just links: http://nonprofitblogexchange.blogspot.com/
      -->  Check out our Denver Open Media blog: http://www.denveropenmedia.org/blog

How to Draw Traffic to your Site:

    • -->  Comment on related blogs – when you comment, often there is a place to put your URL.  If someone likes your comment, they will often follow your link.  Comment often and on a wide variety of sites, and you will draw traffic back to your website.
      -->  Use Social Networking Sites --  Social networks are a way of connecting with like-minded individuals.
      •    Examples of social networks:
      •    Facebook
      •    LinkedIn
      •    Examples of organizations using social networks
      •    Freewheelin - http://www.facebook.com/pages/Freewheelin/24889018277?ref=ts
      •    Barack Obama - http://www.facebook.com/barackobama?ref=ts
      -->  Bookmarking networks – Bookmarking sites promote popular links that users submit and vote on.  They are good way to get more views of your video.  Example of bookmarking sites
      •    http://digg.com/
      •    http://delicious.com/
      •    http://reddit.com/

Video Formats:

    • -->  YouTube accepts a wide range of video file formats such as .WMV, .AVI, .MOV, and .MPG. If you don't think your current video file format is recognized by YouTube, here are a few things that may work well for you:
      •    MPEG4 (Divx, Xvid) format
      •    MP3 audio
      •    Video resolution: 480x360 or higher
      •    Frame Rate: 24fps or higher
      -->  File size/time limits may vary, but on YouTube for example, your videos can be up to 1GB in size and/or 10 minutes in length.

Places to Upload to:

    • -->  Facebook, Archive.org, YouTube, Denver Open Media, Vimeo, Blip.tv

Web Tools that Make it easier:

    • -->  Tubemogul.com: Posts to most of the above sites and more.

Group Discussion -- What’s Next

    • -->  How can you continue using the resources and facilities at Denver Open Media to increase your visibility in the community?
      -->  What are your plans for future videos/studio shows?
      -->  What are you interested in learning more about?

Useful Links:

An Anthropological Introduction to YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TPAO-lZ4_hU&feature=channel

How much time does it take to do social media: http://beth.typepad.com/beths_blog/2008/10/how-much-time-d.html

Ways to promote your video: http://www.socialmedia.biz/2008/02/7-ways-to-promo.html

How to promote your blog: http://www.problogger.net/archives/2007/01/11/how-to-market-your-blog-in-2007/

How to get more comments on your blog: http://www.problogger.net/archives/2006/10/12/10-techniques-to-get-more-comments-on-your-blog/

How nonprofits can use social media: http://beth.typepad.com/beths_blog/

Should your organization use social networking sites? http://www.techsoup.org/learningcenter/internet/page7935.cfm

Nonprofit Organizations and Online Social Networking: http://www.coyotecommunications.com/outreach/osn.html

For Nonprofits Considering Their Own Podcasts: http://www.coyotecommunications.com/outreach/podcasts.html